Mbembe language

Mbembe
Mbembe
Native to	Nigeria
Native speakers	(100,000 cited 1982)
Language family	Niger–Congo? Atlantic–Congo languages Benue–Congo languages Cross River Upper Cross Central East–West Mbembe; ; ; ; ; ; ;
Language codes
ISO 639-3	mfn – inclusive code; Individual code:; oda – Odut village
Glottolog	cros1244
ELP	Odut

Mbembe is a Cross River language of Nigeria. Odut,^[2] a divergent variety spoken in a village far South of the rest of Mbembe, had 20 speakers in 1980 and may be extinct.^[3]

Phonology

Consonants

		Bilabial	Labio- dental	Alveolar	Palatal	Velar	Labio- velar
Nasal	plain	m		n	ɲ	ŋ
Nasal	fortis	mː		nː
Plosive/ Affricate	voiceless	p		t	t͡ʃ	k	k͡p
	voiced	b		d	d͡ʒ	ɡ	ɡ͡b
	fortis			tː		kː	k͡pː
Fricative	voiceless	ɸ	f	s
	voiced	β	v
	fortis		fː	sː
Tap				ɾ
Approximant				l	j		w

Vowels

	Front	Central	Back
High	i	(ɨ)	u
Near-high	(ɪ)		(ʊ)
High-mid	e eː		o oː
Low-mid	ɛ		ɔ ɔː
Low		a aː

Phoneme/Sound	Allophones	Occurrence
/i/ [i]	[ɨ]	in closed syllables except when following /j/ or palatalized consonants
	[ɪ]	in closed syllables when following /j/ or palatalized consonants
	[i]	elsewhere
/u/ [u]	[u̟]	in closed syllables except when following /w/ or labialized consonants
	[ʊ]	in extended syllable-pieces except when following /w/ or labialized consonants
	[u]	elsewhere

^[4]

References

^ Mbembe at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required)
Odut village at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required)
^ Blench (2013) An Atlas of Nigerian Languages
^ "Odut". Ethnologue. Retrieved 2017-07-26.
^ Barnwell, Katherine Grace Lowry (1969). A Grammatical Description of Mbembe (Adun Dialect)- A cross river language. University College London.

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[e18-1] Mbembe at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required)
Odut village at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required)

[2] Blench (2013) An Atlas of Nigerian Languages

[3] "Odut". Ethnologue. Retrieved 2017-07-26.

[4] Barnwell, Katherine Grace Lowry (1969). A Grammatical Description of Mbembe (Adun Dialect)- A cross river language. University College London.